Nathanial headed to his desk from the replicator, one hot black coffee in hand. He sat down at his desk, there was a pile of PADD's stacked so high it had begun to resemble the leaning tower of Pisa! It was unusual for his work to be so heavy, but there was a reason, Ensign Thomas had been diligent in his reports on his current project, infact some may have said he had been too diligent.
He sighed and grabbed the first PADD, it contained inconclusive data on a potential nebula reaction. He took a sip of his coffee and grabbed the next PADD. What he saw next confused and puzzled him, it was a report on another nebula, that wasn't the confusing part, what was confusing was that it had been written up by Ensign Nathanial Doyle. He shook his head and re looked at the PADD, yep it still showed a report written by himself. He checked the stardate, it was dated nearly a year ago. Thinking that either one of his staff was playing a joke or somehow his report had been mixed up with todays reports he punched up the stardate on the computer and reviewed the logs.
He examined all the logs but the log in his hand was not there. It was as if this report had never been filed. He was not one to forget to hand in a report, he had been quite diligent in that regard, infact that is partly why he sat at his desk today, yet this report had never been delivered. Taking the line of thinking that it might be a practical joke he decided to read the report through.
He took another sip of his coffee, just before placing the cup back down on the desk he lifted it back up to his lips and finished off the hot coffee in one go. The writing was his, he knew his own style, and felt that if it was forged he would have been able to tell, yet for the life of him, he could not remember this particular report, sure given he had filled and read many reports while being on the Charon, but he was sure that he would be able to recall any report he had written.
Nathanial looked up from the PADD and noticed the mountain of PADD's that still sat on his desk, he sighed, he wanted to get to the bottom of this peculiar report, but knew he had to get through the other reports first. Placing the PADD with the report down for later examination he continued to read, and sign off on the other reports for the day. Yes Thomas had been busy, Nathanial smiled, the Ensign had great potential, and Nathanial felt that this project might be the key to unlocking that potential and allowing him to shine.
It took a few hours, but finally he had completed reviewing all the PADD's on his desk. He headed to the replicator and ordered another black coffee, he knew he was going to need it, for he would not rest tonight until he figured out what was going on with the erroneous report that had landed in the pile of reports on his desk...
[To be continued]
Lieutenant Nathanial Doyle
Chief Science Officer
USS Charon
